


like your narcissus

by erebones



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Cock Warming, Cuddling & Snuggling, Cunnilingus, Established Relationship, Fluff and Smut, Long-Distance Relationship, Love Poems, M/M, Oral Sex, Penis In Vagina Sex, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Post-Canon, Reunion Sex, Reunions, Trans Claude von Riegan, Trans Male Character, Vaginal Fingering, trying for baby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-10
Updated: 2020-04-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:34:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23577730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erebones/pseuds/erebones
Summary: Khalid observes him, head tilted slightly to the side as though divining the cipher of his innermost thoughts. “You like the idea.”Lorenz shudders at the clasp of his thighs around him. “N-naturally.”“Naturally?”“Doesn’t every man wish to pass their bloodline on to the next generation?”“Please. Give me your answer, beloved, not your father’s.”Slowly, eyes locked with Khalid’s as though waiting to be rebuffed, Lorenz trails a hand down his chest to his belly. Not as flat as it once was—the life of a ruler is more sedentary than the life of an upstart military general—but still reasonably fit beneath the layer of softness. The path of his thoughts is clear. Khalid fits his hand over Lorenz’s and presses them hard against his stomach.
Relationships: Lorenz Hellman Gloucester/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 16
Kudos: 200





	like your narcissus

**Author's Note:**

> this is based on a twitter ramble I went on back in DECEMBER, particularly [this part](https://twitter.com/rachebones/status/1206262082519392257?s=20). I'm VERY ANNOYED by ao3's lack of Family PlanningTM tags so I went ahead and made my own, bc "breeding" didn't feel right. BUT, to go into further detail here, this fic is a PWP about Claude and Lorenz deciding to start a family and having sex about it. Claude is trans man, and I use cock/folds/mons/dick etc. to describe his bits. Also featuring some (I'm sure) poorly translated Persian classical poetry achieved through a little light googling. I'm not a historian or a poet, so apologies if anything is terribly off base. 
> 
> ALSO also I decided as a fun experiment to write this using Khalid instead of Claude. I probably won't do this all the time, but it was a fun exercise! I'm interested to know what ppl think of it. <3

_When, like your narcissus, I go to sleep, a dream I have, more disheveled than your hair. -Mahsati_

The General’s suite at Fódlan’s Locket is fine indeed. There is a small sitting room for entertaining guests and diplomats, and beyond that an opulent boudoir with a sturdy, Goneril-style fourposter laid liberally with furs, a must-have when the winter nights grow cold and lonesome. To offset the frankly ridiculous size of the bedchamber, a great fireplace dominates the northern wall. To the eastern wall is a modest but well-furnished water closet, and a dressing-room for the General’s wife, in the rare event that she might deign to visit the military stronghold-turned-border crossing.

Today the suite plays host not to General Holst, but to a very honored guest. Khalid von Riegan, King of Almyra, stands half-naked in the bedroom, towel around his waist and combing a lightly-scented oil through his damp hair as he watches the clock on the mantlepiece tick on. It’s getting rather late, but he isn’t tired. He arrived earlier in the day on wyvernback, and has already through the motions of being greeted by his hosts, overseeing the settlement of his retinue, meeting with General Holst, and signing off on various celebratory plans that were awaiting his approval for the coming days.

By all right he should be exhausted. There is, perhaps, a bit of weariness of body, a soreness that comes from riding and walking and standing about conversing in the proper courtly manners of a half-familiar country. But his mind is yet awake and ticking, steady as the clock he watches as the spindly gilt-tipped hands move closer and closer to midnight.

At long last, after he has already performed his evening meditations and dressed himself in a heavy velvet robe for sitting in stately comfort by the fire, a knock comes upon the door. Not the outer doors, which are currently guarded by two of his finest soldiers, but the inner bedroom door. Khalid lets his little book of poetry close around his thumb, listening.

A knock again, softer this time but still insistent, followed by the slight creak of the key turning in the lock. Khalid shuts his eyes and lets his head tip against the back of the chair. Lets his breathing slow and his hand slump loosely in his lap, as though just barely clinging to the well-worn volume in his grasp.

The door opens and shuts again, with enough space between for a person to have slipped into the room. Gentle footsteps scuff against the flagstone floor before reaching the thick bearskin rug that covers the floor in front of the hearth. Not boots, but not bare feet; slippers, perhaps. Khalid forces himself to relax further even as his ears strain for a single sound. He can hear nothing, not even the gentle whisper of breathing. It’s mildly alarming—only assassins know how to move in perfect silence—but he trusts his guards. And he’d given explicit instructions for the second room key to be given over to only one person.

Before he can second-guess his instincts, there’s a gentle sigh and the softest, butterfly-light touch to his loose hair. A waft of floral perfume graces his nose and he struggles not to smile.

“I’ve missed you,” comes a quiet whisper: a voice so familiar and dear it nearly brings tears to his eyes. There is a gentle sigh and the rustle of fabric, and he feels the book being taken carefully from his grasp as the newcomer lowers himself to the floor and lays his head on Khalid’s knee.

Safe at last, Khalid peeks open one eye. The smile that touches his lips is instinctive and irrepressible. At his feet sits the Duke of Gloucester, still dressed for travel in a muted lavender-grey doublet and hose, his hair pulled into a braid, heavy boots traded for flat-soled walking shoes. The signet ring of the Riegan House glimmers on his fourth finger as he reads the passage Khalid had been saving.

> _Come, I am lovesick and desolate without you_
> 
> _Come and see how sick I am in this sorrow without you_
> 
> _At night I lament your absence, oh fairy-faced,_
> 
> _And when the morning comes, it is as if I am on fire without you._

“Oh, Khalid,” Lorenz sighs, thumb tracing the letters with reverence.

“For you,” Khalid says. The man at his feet jerks upright, turning to gape at him with the book held to his breast. Khalid grins. “Hello, sweetheart.”

“You were awake?” Lorenz yelps. Before he can scramble upright, Khalid puts a hand on his shoulder, weighing him down. Lorenz stills beneath it and subsides, staring up at him with wide eyes turned to polished amethyst in the candlelight. “Khalid…”

“You’re late.”

“We had some wagon trouble. I ended up riding ahead with a few of my—but that hardly matters now.” Lorenz wavers a moment, hardly blinking, before he finally tears his eyes away and presses his face into Khalid’s lap. “My love.”

Khalid’s heart cracks like spun sugar, and he puts his hand in Lorenz’s hair. “You’re certainly a sight for sore eyes, beloved.”

Lorenz makes a noise like a wounded animal and stays where he is as Khalid winds his braid free. His hair is longer every time they meet, and this time, as he draws his fingers through the long, silken strands, he finds more than a few threads of silver hidden amongst the violet.

“I am a mess from traveling,” Lorenz mumbles, voice muffled by the dressing gown.

“I don’t mind.”

“I missed you.”

“I’ve missed _you_.” Khalid coaxes his face up at last by the chin and smears the wetness from beneath his eyes with his thumbs. “Don’t cry, my dear. This is a happy moment.”

“Undoubtedly.” Lorenz sniffles. “And so I weep with happiness.” He produces a handkerchief from his sleeve and dabs his face before turning his eyes to the little book resting in his lap. “What is this?”

“A humble gift. I’m afraid the parade of elephants won’t arrive until tomorrow with the rest of your dowry, but until then…” Khalid laughs at Lorenz’s dire look and chucks him under the chin. “Here,” he says, rescuing the volume as it threatens to slip to the floor. He flips it open to the first page, where there is a small inscription in his own hand. “Your Almyran has been improving quite admirably, so I decided you were ready for something a little more advanced.”

Lorenz takes the book back and peers at the words stamped into the cover, made more difficult by the dim light. “A book of love poems?”

“That’s right.”

“How thoughtful.” Lorenz traces the handwritten passage on the inside page. “ _For my beloved rose, to whom—_ no, _for whom I pray the sweetest dreams each night._ ”

“Perfect,” Khalid praises, and smiles when Lorenz ducks his head in embarrassment. “I’m not much of a poet myself, I’m afraid, but you may consider each of these as if from my own heart.”

“Thank you, my love. I will treasure it.” Lorenz puts the cover to his lips and then aside, out of the way, and kneels up between Khalid’s feet. “I’m afraid I am not as well prepared as you; you shall have to wait til morning for your own gifts.”

“The best gift of all is right in front of me,” Khalid says gently. He traces the shape of Lorenz’s brow with his thumb. There are more lines here than he remembers. Though they are barely beyond the cusp of thirty years, they both bear burdens heavier than most. The weight of them has left its mark. But Lorenz is as beautiful as ever—perhaps more so, with the evidence of his hard work and tireless commitment revealed in the lines around his eyes, the sternness of his mouth.

“You’re staring,” Lorenz accuses, though he’s doing much the same.

“I can look at you so little, these days. Would you begrudge me five more minutes to look upon the most beautiful face in Fódlan?”

Lorenz wrinkles his nose, breaking the fairy-faced spell; but that is beautiful, too. “Flatterer.”

“My favorite pastime.” Khalid grins and leans down. “May I kiss you?”

“Is that your second favorite pastime?” Lorenz inquires, even as he lifts his chin invitingly.

“Hmm. A difficult choice. I’ll have to think on it more.” Khalid presses their lips together, slow. Warm. “And a little more…”

Lorenz leans into him, pressing him back against the chair as he invades Khalid’s mouth with his tongue and Khalid’s robe with his hands. He is warm from the fire against Khalid’s bare skin; the drag of his fingers through his chest hair burns, emboldens him. Khalid moans shamelessly and widens his thighs, inviting his lover closer.

“You were teasing just now, yes?” Lorenz gasps. He spreads the plackets of Khalid’s robe open and chokes to find him without undergarments.

“Which bit?” Khalid asks, leaning back in the chair. He hooks one knee over the arm, spreading himself open for Lorenz’s perusal, and smiles at the violent blush that suffuses his pale cheeks.

“Th-the, um, the… elephants,” Lorenz says faintly. He takes Khalid’s hand and kisses the palm of it, the weathered knuckles, the calloused fingertips. The signet ring of Gloucester fixed securely to his fourth finger. “And the dowry.” He nibbles gently on the tip of Khalid’s ring finger and smiles as though he’s won something when Khalid presses his finger all the way inside.

“You shall have to be patient and find out tomorrow,” he says, and sighs. “I bathed this evening, if that’s a concern.”

Lorenz’s eyebrows climb to his hairline and he releases Khalid’s finger. “Beloved,” he replies, “I have many concerns, but I assure you that is not one of them.” As if to prove his statement true, he leans in and lays a soft kiss to Khalid’s inner lips. He is warm and a little damp from his bath, but not excessively so; but at the touch of Lorenz’s mouth, gentle and eager, he can feel slickness gathering like rainclouds after a long drought.

“I was—teasing,” Khalid says with a hitch in his voice, eloquence stolen at the touch of his lover. “That is, you don’t need to—to service me, I…” He trails off helplessly, fingers digging into the chair’s arms as Lorenz drags his tongue over the hood of his cock, slow, over and over again. Heat throbs between his legs and he groans, toes curling midair and against the bearskin rug.

“Do you want me to stop?” Lorenz asks, practically breathing the words against his heated flesh.

“No,” Khalid admits.

“Then I shall not.” Lorenz kisses his dark curls almost demurely, pleased with himself. “I have gone nearly a year without the taste of you on my tongue. I must beg you to allow me to savor it.”

Khalid shuts his eyes as Lorenz tongues at his cock. Despite the year that separates them from their last meeting, Lorenz shows no reticence, no uncertainty; he devours Khalid as though he is a feast, dragging his tongue around his cock and between his folds, sucking him into his mouth. Khalid, who has gone without for a very long time, is quickly near the brink. He squirms in his seat as Lorenz presses his thighs apart even wider and licks into his hole. A soft, shallow intrusion, but he clenches around it nonetheless, aching for more.

“Lorenz,” he gasps raggedly. Not quite a plea. “Do you intend to make me beg?”

Lorenz hums against his cock and Khalid quivers, muscles tightening around nothing. “His Majesty can be _made_ to do nothing; but if you wish to beg I am not averse to hearing it.”

Khalid groans against his knuckles and tries to rock against his tongue, but with only one foot on the floor he has very little leverage. Lorenz laughs softly, but, true to his word, teases him no longer. Instead he sucks on him like a sweet, slow but firm and steady, and his first two fingers, wet with Khalid’s own slick, meander down to press shallowly inside him. Not quite fucking him, not the way he wants, but a gentle tease—yet even that subtle pressure against the root of his cock from the inside has him shaking and crying out into the palm of his hand.

“There you are,” Lorenz soothes, pleased with himself. He kisses his cock, still hard and standing erect in its nest of curls, then smears his lips against the stretch of Khalid’s inner thigh. His fingers ease a little deeper. “Have you taken many lovers, in my absence?”

Khalid snorts, arcs his back to coax Lorenz further in. But Lorenz is crafty, and he maintains a steady rhythm, slicking in and out only to the second knuckle as he teases Khalid’s rim mercilessly. “Oh yes. There is one I’m fond of in particular…”

Lorenz hums, hiding a smile as he bites a bruise into Khalid’s leg. “Tell me.”

“You know him intimately… in fact it was you who gifted him to me. That delightful amethyst piece that’s almost the length of you…” Khalid tosses his head back against the chair, tightening down, chasing that high. Lorenz stills his hand. “Lorenz—”

“Did you enjoy it, then?” he purrs, and crooks his fingers just so. “Did he fit you the way I do?”

“Never,” Khalid groans. “Nothing could take the place of you—your co _ck_ —”

His voice cracks at the sudden pressure as Lorenz fucks him in earnest. Each inward thrust seems to echo through the chamber, wet and filthy as Lorenz’s fingers move without impediment. Khalid whines and turns his head to the side, gasping, shivering at the hot, sticky rush of orgasm.

“Lorenz…”

“You’re so lovely,” Lorenz says suddenly, withdrawing his hand. Khalid feels the fleeting urge to pout, but it disappears when Lorenz stands, silhouetted against the flickering fire, and begins to disrobe. Swift, his hands shaking only a little, he unlaces his doublet and drops it carelessly to the floor. His shirt is pulled free and over his head, shoes kicked off, hose peeled down his long, long legs. He’s unmistakably hard in his drawers, but Khalid is hardly given more than a moment to admire it. Before he has even a moment to complain, however, Lorenz is completely bare before him, pale skin turned milky rose in the dim light, cock hanging heavy between his legs as he bows to kiss him.

“Lorenz,” Khalid murmurs against his lips. He can taste himself, taste the languid energy that lays beneath Lorenz’s skin. “I love you.”

Lorenz takes his hands, pulling him upright on stiff legs. “You are my everything.” He sounds like a passage from a book, formal on the page, but Khalid knows he speaks from the heart. “Will you let me take you to bed?”

“Please,” Khalid says, and it sounds like begging. “I’ve thought of nothing else all evening.”

“So eager,” Lorenz coos. He pushes the robe off Khalid’s shoulders, and they stand together naked at last, stripped of all their trappings and their ornaments, two men in love and reunited after a long darkness. Khalid plucks one of Lorenz’s hand from his waist and kisses the back of it.

“I hope you came ready,” he murmurs, enjoying the scent of Lorenz’s skin as he kisses his wrist and up the length of his arm. “I intend to have you many times tonight. As many as you can bear.”

Lorenz shivers, the tables abruptly turned against him. “I am eager for whatever you wish to give me.”

“Hmm.” Still humming with the heat of arousal, Khalid steps closer so that their bodies brush, thighs to thighs, his exhale to Lorenz’s inhale. His lover’s manhood twitches against his mons and slips between his thighs at the slightest provocation, the head fat and round against his perineum. “And what will you give _me_ in return?”

Lorenz swallows. “Whatever you wish.”

“Truly?” Khalid tips his chin back slightly to look him in the eye. Slick gathers between his legs and drips onto the shaft of Lorenz’s cock; he can feel the way Lorenz jerks at the sensation, nostrils flaring wide and hand gone damp and trembling in his grip. “ _What_ ever?”

“There is nothing you can ask for that I will not give.” Lorenz shudders, every ounce of strength in his body bent toward standing perfectly still. “If it is in my power, it is yours.”

Khalid hums and widens the set of his feet on the floor. It brings him a little shorter than before, at eye level now with Lorenz’s flushed sternum, but it also brings Lorenz’s cock more securely against his core, the shaft sliding against his wetness. “What if,” he whispers, “I ask you to spend inside me, again and again?”

Lorenz trembles. “Then it shall be done.”

Khalid smiles and lets go of his hand, reaching down to fondle his sac. “What if I ask you to stay inside me once you’ve had your fill? Lay with me, listening to my heartbeat?”

“It would be my great pleasure, my love.”

Khalid lowers his voice. “And if I asked you to sire a child with me?”

The room is suddenly very quiet. Even the fireplace seems to have softened, its crackle worn down to the occasional hiss and sigh of flame on wood. Against him, Lorenz breathes deeply, and his cock twitches slightly against Khalid’s hole. “Khalid…”

“Tell me. Yes or no.”

The bob of Lorenz’s throat is barely visible in the dark. “Yes,” he breathes, hands alighting at Khalid’s hips. “If that is what you want, then yes.”

“Is it what _you_ want?”

Lorenz’s lips curl up just slightly. “Whatever you desire is what I want.” He tips his head and kisses him before Khalid can protest the non-answer, and his mouth is hot and hungry. “I had not considered it before,” Lorenz says against his lips, “but if this is what you truly want…”

“It is.” Khalid swallows against the sudden dryness of his mouth, shifting his weight until his thighs close gently around the spear of his cock. “More than anything.” He reaches up, combing his fingers through Lorenz’s hair as his lover watches him. “Our long separation won’t last forever. This week is the first step toward unity—for our countries, and for ourselves. I’ve been thinking about this for some time. Since our last meeting.”

“And you never…” Lorenz falters, eyes fluttering half-shut as he struggles to maintain his composure with his erection nestled warm and close between Khalid’s legs. “You never thought to write to me about it?”

“It seemed like the sort of thing one should convey in person.” Khalid observes him, head tilted slightly to the side as though divining the cipher of his innermost thoughts. “You like the idea.”

Lorenz shudders at the clasp of his thighs around him. “N-naturally.”

“Naturally?”

“Doesn’t every man wish to pass their bloodline on to the next generation?”

“Please. Give me _your_ answer, beloved, not your father’s.”

Slowly, eyes locked with Khalid’s as though waiting to be rebuffed, Lorenz trails a hand down his chest to his belly. Not as flat as it once was—the life of a ruler is more sedentary than the life of an upstart military general—but still reasonably fit beneath the layer of softness. The path of his thoughts is clear. Khalid fits his hand over Lorenz’s and presses them hard against his stomach.

“To raise a family with you would be the greatest endeavor of my life,” Lorenz says, soft with sincerity. “Any child we make together… I…”

Khalid tugs him down gently by the hair to kiss him. “I know. Trust me, I’ve spent a year thinking about it.”

Lorenz buries a kiss in the crook of his neck, slim hands grasping at Khalid’s waist like it’s the only thing keeping him afloat. “Let us go to bed then, my love, and make the most of the time we have.”

There is a change in Lorenz, then. He takes Khalid by the hand and leads him to the bed, fussing with the furs and blankets until an appropriately comfortable nest has been achieved. Khalid permits himself to be doted on, too charmed and enamored to feel even remotely patronized. When he is laying on his back, a pillow under his hips and Lorenz between his knees, he flings his arms out upon the mattress and laughs for the sheer joy of his lover’s nearness. Lorenz tucks his hair behind his ears fastidiously and arcs an eyebrow.

“Do I amuse you?” he inquires, velvet-soft. His fingertips drag slow, mindless patterns on the insides of Khalid’s thighs, and he feels frail, fragile, liable to burst like a soap bubble under Lorenz’s patient hands.

“You _astound_ me,” Khalid replies, breath hitching in his chest. Lorenz kisses his chest, lips soft and damp, then his nipples. Battle scars criss-cross his torso, faded with time, and Lorenz follows them all like a cartographer exploring familiar territory. “Lorenz… ah—!”

“Too harsh?” Lorenz murmurs. He rubs the spot he’d nipped, blooming red as a rose above Khalid’s navel.

“Just unexpected.” Khalid laughs again, tickled into it by Lorenz’s fingers on his stomach. “Lor, quit it! Gods, you’re playful tonight.”

“Forgive me,” Lorenz says humbly, though his eyes gleam with a wicked glint as he trails his fingers southward, parting Khalid with his thumbs. “I am simply… I missed you,” he finishes, clumsy. Pink-cheeked the way he was as a young man, fumbling through a confession in the rose garden before Edelgard threw down her challenge and called war upon the continent.

But that was then, and this is now. No longer a boy, Lorenz is penitent as well as bashful, and entirely unselfconscious. With his knees tucked under him, he curls forward and licks between where his thumbs extend, tasting the slickness there. Khalid shivers and watches him. Despite Lorenz's best efforts, his hair falls around his face, framing his furrowed brow, his studious, committed expression. His mouth works lightly, too lightly to get Khalid off—more for show than anything. Heat sizzles under Khalid’s skin nonetheless and he moans, tipping his hips up to encourage him.

Only when Khalid is panting and sobbing for breath, twisting his hands in the sheets fit to tear the seams, does Lorenz deem him ready. He wipes his chin carelessly with the palm of his hand and slicks the runoff over the head of his cock, still hard and leaking unattended. Khalid whimpers.

“Are you ready for me, my love?” Lorenz asks, tugging his hips forward a little on the pillow.

“Been ready,” Khalid grunts. He struggles to breathe normally as Lorenz eases forward, running the underside of his cock along Khalid’s cunt. “Lor—”

“Shhh. Listen.” Lorenz plants his hands on the mattress, rocking back and forth with painful, agonizing slowness. Each movement drags audibly through Khalid’s folds, making slick sounds that kindle tension all through his pelvis. “Listen to how wet you are for me.”

“Lorenz…”

“Easy, my darling.” Despite his words, Lorenz’s voice is strained, face flushed and dewy as he struggles to control his own pace. Pale purple flyaways stick to his face and his lips are swollen red. He’s gorgeous, a complete wreck. Khalid wants to devour him. Wants to _be devoured_ by him. “Just breathe.”

“Please,” Khalid chokes. He can feel the round, fat head of Lorenz’s cock rubbing at his hole, teasing the rim before sliding up to kiss his own erection. “Lorenz, please, put a baby in me—”

Whatever he means to say next is punched out of him as Lorenz finally, finally enters him. Not all at once—he’s too well-mannered for such a thing—but just an inch or two, stretching him wide. Toys or not, Khalid has grown unaccustomed to being fucked. His mouth drops open and he clenches around the intrusion as it presses in slow, its passage eased by his own slick.

“I intend to,” Lorenz says, voice low. He peppers kisses to Khalid’s chest, his throat, as his cock splits him open from the inside, still easy and slow and maddening. One hand supports his weight against the mattress; the other rubs slow spirals around Khalid’s erection, teasing and pinching him as he adjusts to Lorenz’s girth. “You’re so tight,” Lorenz murmurs. His next inward thrust is a little deeper, and Khalid grunts on an exhale at the feeling. “Not so many lovers after all, hmmm?”

“Nothing can compare to you, sweetheart,” Khalid gasps. “Not even the most expensive dildo in all of Fódlan—ah!”

Lorenz seats himself and holds there, trembling. He’s in deep—Khalid can feel him almost against his cervix, stretching him open, staking his claim. “You’re dangerous for my ego,” Lorenz warns with a smug little smile. And then he draws out and pushes back in, slow. “Are you wet enough, dearest? Do you need some oil?”

“Not yet,” Khalid chokes. He leans up and Lorenz meets him halfway, rocking his hips gently as they kiss. The stretch is good, so good. He nips at Lorenz’s lips and gets a chuckle and a particularly hard thrust in response. “Nnh… Lorenz, please.”

“Put your knees up, darling.” Lorenz smooths his hands under Khalid’s thighs, coaxing them up toward his chest. His next thrust sinks even deeper, and he holds that depth a moment, grinding in quick, short thrusts that punch the air out of Khalid’s lungs before easing back into long, slow, expansive strokes, each one a brilliant bloom of heat at its apex.

The room echoes with the sounds of their lovemaking: the wet slap of skin, the little muffled cries Khalid can’t help emitting, Lorenz’s huffing breaths of exertion. Khalid laughs at him between moans, chiding him for going soft, and then wails to the ceiling when Lorenz picks up the pace in retribution. Sparks burst behind his eyes and between his legs—everything is aflame, and he wants more, _more_ —

Lorenz smears the heel of his hand over his erection and Khalid’s whole body stiffens, like it’s not quite sure what’s happening. But he knows; he can feel it coming from a long way off, rolling in like thunder off the ocean. It gathers in his guts, teased to life by the head of Lorenz’s cock in him, and bursts outward in a slow, roiling wave, spurred on by the fingers around his dick until he’s shuddering and crying out fit to wake the whole Throat.

Once upon a time, Lorenz would have chided him for his noise; but those days have passed. Lorenz _encourages_ him as he fucks him through it, mouth against his ear, breathing _yes_ and _louder, darling_ and _I love to hear you like this_. Khalid himself feels no shame. Only pleasure, fizzing and popping like firecrackers sprinkled on warm stone. Only relief, as his legs tremble and quake in Lorenz’s hands. Only gratitude as he whispers, hoarse from screaming, “Your turn, beloved. Inside. Please, give it to me—”

His words are reduced to a strained whimper, frayed at the edges, higher-pitched than he’s been in years as Lorenz grinds into him deeply. The soft gasps in his ear are like music. Khalid moans and grabs at him, pawing at his backside, encouraging him until Lorenz finally jerks to an unsteady halt, the final few thrusts sloppy and strained.

“Goddess,” Lorenz groans. He bites a firm, toothy kiss to the crook of Khalid’s neck, sweaty now from exertion and body heat. “Are you all right, my love? Did I hurt you?”

“I’m wonderful. Brilliant.” Khalid cups the nape of his neck, fingers curling through the sweaty strands, and brings their lips together for a kiss. “Stay?”

“Of course.” Lorenz shifts a little to make sure he’s comfortable but stays where he is, cock slowly softening inside his body. Khalid kisses him for as long as he can bear before Lorenz succumbs and buries a yawn in his chest. “Forgive me.”

Khalid chuckles and it rocks them both, Lorenz quaking like a tree in a gale. “You are forgiven.” He strokes lazy fingertips down his long, slender spine and back up again, enjoying his smooth skin, the weight of his lover pressing him down into the mattress. “You’ve had a long journey. Rest.”

“We both have.” Lorenz nuzzles the slope of his neck sleepily. “If you give me half an hour to nap and change I can be ready for you again.”

“Take your time.” Khalid lays quietly, eyes half-lidded as he listens to the ticking clock, the gentle thud of Lorenz’s slowing heartbeat against his sternum. Inside him, Lorenz softens and slips free, still wet with Khalid’s slick and his own spend. He tightens his internal muscles, trying not to spill a drop.

“I shall have to buy a plug for you,” Lorenz murmurs, shifting his arm between them to pet his leaking hole. He kisses Khalid’s cheek, his jaw, smiling when Khalid whimpers. “Keep my seed inside of you until you conceive.”

“If you can find such a thing for purchase here, I’ll be very impressed.”

“Perhaps a commission, then. If I can find a discreet craftsman on such short notice.” Lorenz withdraws his hand and his body, despite Khalid’s muddled sounds of protest, kissing his upturned knee as he goes. “I shan't be long. Do you need anything? Water? Wine?”

“There’s a pitcher of water near the window—”

“I see it.”

Lorenz slips from the bed and pads naked to the window. With the firelight so low and their room at the highest spire of Fódlan’s Throat, there’s no risk of being seen from outside, but Khalid admires his daring anyway. Admires his pale skin turned honey-gold by the fire—the long, dark fall of his silver-tinted hair as it spills down his back nearly to his floating rib, mussed from travel and exertion. It sways against his spine as he pours a goblet of water from the silver pitcher, as he returns to the bed with his limbs all languid and his member soft in its nest of lavender curls. He leans down to brush a kiss to Khalid’s brow and hands over the goblet.

“I’ll be right back.”

Khalid sits up against the pillows just enough to sip some of the water without spilling it all over himself, following Lorenz with his eyes. “Feel free to leave the door open.”

Lorenz glances back over his shoulder, eyebrow raised. “Voyeur.”

“I’ve missed you.” He’s laying the plaintive sorrow on a little thick, but Lorenz sighs, pushes his hair back from his face, and leaves the door open.

Despite his earlier assertions, Khalid finds himself stifling yawns into his fist even as he watches his lover bathe. He doesn’t run a bath, but there is a deep basin of water that heats readily with the touch of a rune. Lorenz runs a wet cloth over his skin from head to toe, following it with a lightly-scented lotion for freshness; then he dips his hair into the bowl and rinses it clean in lieu of a proper scrubbing. By the time he’s finished, Khalid has set the goblet aside and turned his cheek against the pillow, halfway to a proper doze. The day drags at him, weighing down his limbs. His eyelids feel heavy as two stones. Framed in the half-open doorway, Lorenz stretches his arms over his head to tease a comb through the roots of his hair, body licked by candlelight. Khalid blinks heavily. Once. Twice.

A soft touch on his cheek startles him awake sometime later. He flails a bit, disoriented, peering through the dark. “Mmgh—wha… Lor?”

“It’s just me,” Lorenz murmurs, voice thick with unshed laughter. “Shall we retire for the evening, my love?”

“Mm… wanted you to… fuck me ’gain…”

“In the morning, perhaps?” Lorenz suggests archly. He must have tamped the fire down to mere coals, for Khalid can scarcely make him out. Only his outline, the silky-fine hairs at his temple frizzing outward like a dandelion puff. He strokes his knuckles along the whiskers lining Khalid’s jaw and kisses him softly in the dark. “I love you.”

“Mmm.” Khalid pushes out his chin, half pout half pursuit, and makes a pleased little hum when Lorenz returns for seconds, and thirds. His mouth slackens, softens, and their tongues lap at each other sweetly, almost shy. “Love you.” Another kiss, shallower this time. “Love the children I’m going to make with you.”

Lorenz hums and wraps his arms around him, pulling him in close. The pillow under his bum is annoying now, so Khalid shoves it away, its purpose served, and insinuates a knee between Lorenz’s thighs with impunity.

“When…” Lorenz ventures, and trails off again immediately, cheeks warm against Khalid’s lips.

“When what, my dear?”

“When will you… know? Forgive me, I have very little experience in these matters.”

“A couple of weeks, at the earliest.” Khalid chews the confession over in his mind a moment before giving it voice. “I… there is a midwife employed in the palace who has been quite helpful to me, answering questions, helping calculate my cycle. I’ve not worn my contraceptive rune in a fortnight. If my monthlies don’t arrive in a few weeks…”

“So far away,” Lorenz murmurs. “You’ll be back in Almyra by then, and I in Derdriu.”

“I will write to you as soon as I know. I will send my fastest horseman—nay, my fastest wyvern rider over the mountains, I swear it.” Khalid clasps his lover’s hand in his own and kisses the back of it: an earnest oath. “Will you come to me, when it’s time?”

“As soon as I can be spared. I will begin preparations for a leave of absence as soon as the summit is over.” Lorenz kisses him, his lips and cheeks and his brow where he wears the lines of a perpetual studious frown. “I want to be with you. Every second, every breath of your term and beyond.” His hand grazes the curve of Khalid’s waist, hovers over his belly where its softness presses up to Lorenz’s lean ribs. “Is that selfish of me, that I would rather drop every responsibility I owe to Leicester in favor of being at your side?”

“If it’s selfish, then I am just as guilty as you.” Khalid sighs, smiles, rests his brow against Lorenz’s hair. “Let us not forget why we are here. To unite our countries, ally our people. I have no wish to be King forever; nor do I think you wish to always be Duke.”

“Only for as long as it is necessary.” Lorenz smiles, eyes glittering. “And now we have a deadline.”

“Ah, you discover my true motive. A little extra incentive for these talks to go smoothly.”

Lorenz sighs. “You are incorrigible.”

“What? Nothing wrong with a bit of extra leverage on my end, as I see it.”

“If you think I’m going to give up land use rights willy-nilly simply because you could be carrying my child—”

“Will you not?”

“ _Claude._ ”

“Oh, dear, I’ve done it now.” Khalid laughs at the put-upon expression on his love’s face and kisses his brow smooth again. “Fear not, Your Grace, I have only the best interests of Fódlan _and_ Almyra at heart. Whatever benefits one must also benefit the other.”

“I know you do,” Lorenz sighs. Relenting, he kisses Khalid sweetly on the lips before dropping his head back onto the pillow. “Now rest, my love. We have a long and tiring week ahead of us, and we must keep up our strength. _You_ in particular.”

“Lorenz…”

“Will you not permit me to dote on you, beloved? After so long apart?”

“Don’t give me that look.”

“ _What_ look?”

“That _pouting_ look. The one that gets you whatever you want.”

“And why shouldn’t I use it, if it works so effectively?

“I am not suddenly made of glass—”

“I know, dear heart. But you _are_ only a mortal man, however godlike your physical charms.”

The discussion carries on like this in much the same manner for nearly half an hour. By the time they concede to their exhaustion, Khalid nearly feels ready to go again—but Lorenz is yawning into his shoulder, and Khalid is struggling to keep his own eyes open even as his lips move of their own accord, determined to parry each riposte his lover sends his way.

Thus defeated, by their own bodies if not by each other, the King of Almyra and the Duke of Leicester kiss one another chastely and surrender to sleep, hearts content, bodies sated, and minds at peace in the ruminations of what the coming weeks might bring.

**Author's Note:**

> the poem Claude is reading when Lorenz comes to his room is adapted from a poem by Saadi Shirazi.
> 
> thank u for reading! as always you can find me at @rachebones on twitter, or being horny and ridiculous @racheboners.


End file.
